I really enjoyed the soundtrack to your game and I would like to know what the instruments or the equipment that you use to make the music for it.

Hey

It's 90% vintage analog synths from the 80's, a little bit of Reaktor and Absynth, and Vienna Orchestral Library for the strings.

And some friends for the choir

I love it! lol even the musicians answer questions posed to them on the forums

I didn't expect to have the Vienna Orchestral Library to involved. lol



Well done, the Soundtrack is great!

love the soudtrack!



This may be the opportunity to ask about the gerry Version of the choir of the endless. Does he actually sing a real text in english or French or is it just jibberish?

love the soudtrack!



This may be the opportunity to ask about the gerry Version of the choir of the endless. Does he actually sing a real text in english or French or is it just jibberish?

We did a short interview with our music/sound guys a little while ago: http://forums.amplitude-studios.com/content.php?202-Endless-Space-soundtrack-on-Bandcamp

What’s Game Audio Factory?

Vincent (CEO): Game Audio Factory is a French company specialised in Video Games Sound Engineering. Our particularity is that we are able to handle an entire game’s sound production, from engine consulting to final tests, without forgetting sound effects production, SFX, music, voice recording, and localization as well.

Game Audio Factory is currently developing with Solidanim a smooth way to catch facial motion available at their recording studios. They are the French representatives among the Native Prime localization group.





The Game Audio Factory team

Vincent: Game Audio Factory is now the biggest game sound dedicated team in Europe. We are 12 people with different specialties and know-how around sound engineering. The team who’s worked on the Endless Space project is made of Arnaud Roy (Sound Director), Benjamin Michenaud (Sound Designer), Fly By No (Composer), as well as several translators, voice actors and localization people.





How did the Endless Space project go? What were your influences?

Arnaud (Sound Director): I started working on Endless Space in September 2011 as a Sound Art Director. My job first was to listen to Romain and Mathieu’s requests in sound and music matters. Later on, we gathered and listened to music, movies and game excerpts in order to get to know better their tastes and expectations. The main references went from Mass Effect to Start Wars, with Star Treck to BattleStar Galactica, Civilization and Eve Online. All of these references inspired and helped us making Endless Space’s own soundtrack.

As regard to the ambience, we chose to shape up a fairy galaxy, with its beautiful and shiny touch, I really wanted to emphasise this and give the magical sound the game deserves. Endless Space’s ambience feels light, with a breeze and chiming bells. Space battles, however, were a real challenge! There were so many events happening! We tried to give each weapon its own personality, using flame or electric sounds.



Fly By No (Composer): In Endless Space, there are two main musical universes: ambience music, and more narrative and epic music for battle and cinematic scenes. For the latter, I used an Armenian oboe, a very expressive duduk, which are typically found in Bear McCreary’s work on BattleStar Galactica.

For the ambience music, I started with a first draft, inspired by Mass Effect galactic map’s music, with a small ritornello in the background. It was the “TransX” track. For these tunes, I almost only worked with analogic keyboards from the 80s, like the Prophet or the Juno60. These instruments have such an incredible sound, very rich and poetic at the same time, something that virtual keyboards often lack. I like the idea to have a sound, like in those Sci-Fi cartoons I used to watch when I was a kid, or the music by Vangelis for Blade Runner.

Afterwards, it evolved a little bit. As I’m a huge fan of electro artists like Plaid, Square Pusher or Aphex Twin, I wanted to implement electro staccato rhythm that could add a more modern touch. Then, on tracks like “Flawless Theory” for instance, I used voices and choirs, to emphasise on the epic.



Benjamin (Sound Designer): Well for me, my work on Endless Space has been done through several prototyping phases, especially for the battles. The relative similarity in the tracks that are played almost simultaneously made it kind of difficult for me. However, that kind of challenge is always motivating! Beyond the battles, the UI and ambience have been two important parts of my job: we try to create a dynamic system that reacts depending on the players’ location in the menu and the galaxy view.

The ES universe is quite varied, especially regarding the different races. We tried to use as many game elements that were available to us as possible, to make this soundtrack.

And, to sum up a little bit, working with the Amplitude team went very well. It was agreeable to work with a team this nice and open minded! By the way, the duck sounds we used for a few prototypes will probably be remembered.





Why releasing the soundtrack on Bandcamp?

Fly By No: I believe this will mainly be interesting for audiophiles, as the entire soundtrack is already available in mp3 format (192kbs) with the Admiral and Emperor Edition purchase. Players who would like to get a high quality soundtrack, just like the one that came out of our studio, will be able to download it on Bandcamp in a FLAC format, in 24 bites, 48khz et other available formats for only $5 or more if they want to.





What can we expect for this Add-On 2 “Echoes of the Endless”?

Fly By No: There will be 5 new tracks, with quite a few choirs and always those good old keyboards! These 5 new tracks are numbered from 20 to 24 in the Admiral and Emperor Edition’s soundtrack folder. However, in the Bandcamp version, they’ll be mixed to the other tunes.





Links

Bandcamp: Endless Space - Fly By No

Game Audio Factory: website

Thanks Steph'nie, totally missed it

Thank you guys !

For the choir version of "the endless" tune, it's the same as Gary's version, but i used IRCAM tools to pitch his voice and to change its formant into a "sort of female" voice. I did it several times with different settings in order to have a "choir" effect. I used this cheat many times with my voice in the OST, even if i'm an awful singer

Never fear. Your singing abilities do not determine your success as a singer. lol Just look at the Vocaloid genre



btw is there a reason some of the songs are listed as done by FlyByNo and some are just listed as done by Amplitude Studios? I thought FlyByNo did them all. Or are those ones done by that Audio factory company?

FlyByNo: Do you have any material under another alias?



Edit: By the way, is DBlue Glitch used on the drums for the battle-music?

You can find some other tunes on soundcloud

https://soundcloud.com/flybyno



And my friend Gary's rockband :

http://maobi.bandcamp.com/



Db Glitch is not used in battledrums, it's Livecut with SquarePusher Mode On !

ha, the wonders of soud editing, great work.

FlyByNo wrote:
You can find some other tunes on soundcloud

https://soundcloud.com/flybyno

I knew that one already. I actually link to it in the description of a series I'm running at YouTube.

FlyByNo wrote:
Db Glitch is not used in battledrums, it's Livecut with SquarePusher Mode On !

I didn't know that VST, going to check it out! DBG can be a bit awkward to control.